


Cole - A Short Story

by Samara_W



Category: Original Work
Genre: Anxiety, Coping, Death, Depression, Hospitals, One Shot, Other, PTSD, Paramedic - Freeform, Patient loss, Sad, School Assignment, Short, Short One Shot, Short Stories, Short Story, mental health, paramedics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-04
Updated: 2019-08-04
Packaged: 2020-07-30 23:43:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20105584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Samara_W/pseuds/Samara_W
Summary: A short story about a paramedic losing a patient for the first time. Written for an English Assessment.





	Cole - A Short Story

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys! Thanks for coming to read my old English class assignment. It's a pretty decent story but the writing could definitely have been better if I had more room for movement. Sadly, the word limit was 1000 and I was already over when I handed this in. If anyone is interested though, I'll absolutely write a better, updated version. I love Cole so much.

Cold, empty and lifeless blue eyes; like a dark ocean eerily calm despite the storm raging above. Translucent skin, almost colourless and slick with salty sweat. White blonde hair clumped with blood and stained dark crimson, creating a halo around her head - a stark contrast to gaping lips that had already begun to turn a bluish hue. She was cold too, despite the rooms obvious warmth and the clamminess of her skin. Cold like the ice children skate on in the bitter depths of winter and she’s still; so very, very still.

She was a young woman, a girl, a child. Someone who would never grow old or even turn 18. She would never fall in love, walk down the aisle to a waiting groom, never hold her own child in her arms. She would never graduate from high school, attend university or get her dream job. An entire life had been ripped from this world, from the innocent and undeserving girl lying dead in a hospital bed, taken far too soon.

An agonised scream tore itself from Cole’s raw throat, echoing around them, slicing through the din of the emergency department like a newly sharpened knife. Tears streamed freely down his reddened cheeks in a steady flow, the way a waterfall cascades down a cliff face after a typhoon. His small body trembled, stomach rolling and gurgling uneasily as he stumbled backwards, only the firm hands on his shoulders keeping him upright. So lost in the image of blank blue eyes he was, he couldn’t even register her being wheeled away or an older paramedic guiding him to a nearby chair.

_Not enough,_ he thinks. _Could have saved her, should have. If I had been faster, better, someone else. Could have, should have, my fault, my fault, my fault. My failure. _

Days went on like that. _Could have, should have, my fault._ The words echo around his head, taunting and torturing him relentlessly, like nails being repeatedly and forcefully stabbed into his heart. Guilt plagued him, a heavy burden weighing on his shoulders, crushing. As for sleep, it would never come easy and when it finally arrived, was always accompanied by the vision of those blank blue eyes. The girl's death became a black mark upon Cole’s damned soul, a disease taking over and infecting everything in its ever-extending reach. 

It was a little over a week later when the family stormed into the hospital, tracking down Cole. A hysterical mother, and enraged father and a little boy who just wanted to know when his big sister was coming home. The sight alone ached, fingernails digging into an already broken mind. The first punch wasn’t unexpected. I deserve this. I killed their daughter. The hits continued, driving home every point Cole had already told himself over the last few days until security finally pulled his attacker off of him. Even with the incomplete family gone he remained on the floor, quickly developing bruises becoming a physical sign of his failure, of that disease in his soul, of the guilt sitting in his heart like an ancient gnarled root. 

A drop of bright red blood falls from his lips, splattering on the clean white floor.

_My defeat._

He was there for a while, people milled around the department, towering above him as they went about their business. Nobody pays any mind to him, not to the monster laying beaten and bloody on the floor, back against the forest green coloured wall. He curls in on himself, shutting his rapidly swelling eyes as hot tears begin their too common, steady flow. Should have, could have, my fault. His slightly disfigured face further contorts in his grief and he buries it into his knees, sobbing. _Killer, monster, not good enough, my fault._ He swallows hard, trying to get rid of the hard lump in his throat but only succeeding in forcing it down to sit heavily in the pit of his stomach. He can’t breathe, can’t feel any oxygen fill his lungs no matter how hard he tries, no matter how much air he tries to take in. Bitter fingernails crawl under long sleeves to scratch at fragile pale skin, drawing blood. Somewhere deep in the back of his mind he knows he’s having a panic attack like he did when he was a teenager back in Vancouver. _My fault._ A heavy hand lands on his back and his head shoots up in fear to look into concerned, honey-coloured eyes. He takes a deep breath and shakes his head before standing.

Crimson drips down slender fingers.

_My failure._

Honey-coloured eyes became constant. Warm concern nestled soft eyes flecked with gold was the single thing Cole could rely on every day. Something he could take comfort in when traitorous thoughts would turn to endless pools of blue and the creeping darkness threatened to consume him. He found tranquillity and serenity in the company of a new and dear friend.

“Cole.” It felt strange to hear his name, so used to the voices in his head calling him monster and murderer.

“Yes?” Cole winced, pained by the obvious alarm in his voice and the way his head shot up far too quickly. Evidence of the lasting effects that girls death had on him.

“Easy Cole, It’s just me. Just Alistair.” Alistair. Honey eyes, friend, older paramedic. Even with the serious tone of voice, he remained a comfort for Cole. “We need to talk.”

“Talk? What, uh, what about?” Cole knew he sounded panicked. Heard it as much as felt the fear settle deep in his gut.

“You and this demon in your head that you’re allowing to tell you that you’re a monster.”

“I **am** a monster, Alistair. I killed a girl.” It seemed like the only reply, seemed like the truth, even as Alistair’s kind face hardened.

“You are no more a monster than any other paramedic here. Are you saying we’re all killers too because we can’t save even patient?”

“Of course not,” Cole blinks, “not everyone can be saved.”

“What makes this girl any different? What, Cole?” It’s angry, not a question but a furious demand.

“She could have been saved! If only I were better! Any other paramedic here could have saved her!”

“No, Cole! They couldn’t! She was going to die no matter what. Her brain was dead and her heart could barely beat as long as it did. She died long before the paramedics even knew. So what makes her death **your** fault?” Cole didn’t have an answer.

“I-“

“You don’t know. You don’t know because there is no difference between you and any other paramedic here. I am sick of you acting as if it were you who killed her. You wouldn’t blame anyone else if it were their patient, you would blame the drunk driver who slammed into her, so why blame yourself?” Eyes alight with fire and a glare set firmly in place, Alistair stalked off, seething.

It was an abrupt end to a hard conversation. A hard conversation that, without Cole’s knowledge, achieved its purpose. It made him question the reality he had built for himself, the reality where the girl's injuries weren’t fatal, the reality where he as good as killed her with his inability to save her. It made the demons in his head quiet, the spread black in his core halt. _What if?_ He wondered. _What if, maybe, she was going to die no matter who was on call that night?_

Cole would never have thought a single conversation would fix him. It didn't really. That inky black disease remained and that gnarled root in his heart would take years to unfurl and recede. But that one talk had given him a start. It had drawn him back to reality and given him the courage to go on. It forced him to face facts and in turn, forgive himself. Because in reality, he can't save everyone. Everyone must die sometime and that's okay. It's okay because it's their journey, not their end, that truly matters. And it's okay because he tries his best and because he does everything he can for them. As for Cole... Monsters, bad people, they don't worry about not being good. 

That's how Cole knows that **he's** okay.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Please leave feedback xx


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